


i was thirsty so i drank

by hamiltrashed



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Anal Sex, Cartographical analogies out the ass, Love Bites, M/M, Nature, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Rick likes marking Daryl as his own, Sex in the woods, idek I haven't written Rickyl in like two months so???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-29 00:25:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7662988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hamiltrashed/pseuds/hamiltrashed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick and Daryl in the woods outside the prison; Rick marks Daryl as his own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i was thirsty so i drank

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cornbread5287](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cornbread5287/gifts).



> I wrote this ficlet for cb as a sort of deal. cb held up her end so I am holding up mine. I hope this is alright 'cause I haven't Rickyl'd in like, two months. We'll see what happens! (:

If Rick looks close in the fading light of sunset, there is a map on Daryl’s body. It’s a treasure map, an atlas, leading to all the spots where Rick has touched, the ink that connects them blooming on his skin in varying shades of yellow-purple and blue-black. Little fingerprint bruises in trails all along his hips and inner thighs, the places that Rick likes to grab when they’re in the moment, that Rick likes to mark as his own. If anybody asks, Daryl is his own man, but he’s Rick’s, too, and Rick watches him sometimes, Daryl’s own fingers exploring all the hickeys and teeth marks and little bruises in admiration of all the ways Rick lays claim to him. So much that his very blood bursts with it.

It took a godawful long time, but when it came down to it, neither of them had the energy or desire to fight it. They fell together as things sometimes just do, and they continue to work because they rely on and trust each other in a way that would make even the grandest love songs fall short. It started with fast, frantic fucking, with Rick bending over and begging for it, emotional and needy, desperate for Daryl to fuck him as hard as he hated himself. Instead, Daryl fucked him then and still does in a way that says he knows Rick is more than the sum of his sins. There is love there, genuine affection and such compassion, too, but it feels like warmth and intimacy and adoration far more than it has ever felt like charity. 

When Daryl fucks Rick, Rick leaves these little marks on him out of desperation. But when Daryl is on his back, Rick leaves them with intent, sucking and biting and touching and grabbing and holding on until Daryl’s spine is bowed and quaking. Until he’s telling the world Rick’s name. Until he leaves a mark or ten on Rick, too.

Today, they’ve returned to quick. Fast and a little chaotic. Daryl has one arm curled around a tree, the other craned over his shoulder, tangling into dark, greying curls, still damp from a shower but half-dry in the sun. He tugs at Rick’s hair while Rick mouths at the back of his neck, fingers dancing along Daryl’s hips, then holding tight as he thrusts forward into Daryl. Rick’s teeth scrape along varying shades of tanned skin, his tongue tracing over the evidence of all the times they’ve done this before. And the moans; christ, the moans are something else, all hisses and growls and grunts and groans, curse words and each of their names said like chants, over and over, and perhaps they will summon a spirit in this way. A spirit to move in them and through them and keep them here together, until it all ends. Until it all returns to dust. 

Rick breathes Daryl in, straight into his lungs, feels so much like they could collapse right in his chest beneath the weight of how good this is. With so much on his mind, with so many things in this life that hurt, it’s nice to have this painless and pure thing to live on. Better than booze and more addictive by half, it feels just like salvation. Rick rolls his hips forward again and again and Daryl, as always, asks for more. He’s never been greedy but for this. This, he tells Rick, is something he wants, something he must have, something he’ll get and always want more of.

They scare away a rabbit, a half dozen birds, but instead of bemoaning the loss of tonight’s dinner, they thank their lucky stars for a momentary lapse in walkers. The assholes have never been known to respect a damn thing but their own hunger, and yet, for a second, it’s as though they’re willing to let Rick and Daryl be. Just be. 

But even left alone by nature, they don’t last long. They never do anymore. Maybe in the rare instance when they take their time, but when time is often so short, when they know someone may seek them out, they just can’t help but let go in what they once might have thought of as an embarrassingly short amount of time. Yet it’s still twenty minutes of bliss, still twenty minutes of Rick fucking Daryl with every ounce of energy in him. Daryl arches against him, rocks back onto him, hangs onto the tree Rick has him against for dear life as if gravity will knock his legs from under him. It doesn’t, but only just barely. 

When it’s over, when Rick marks Daryl as his own in a different way, it always feels like a denouement. There’ll be a sequel, sure, endless sequels, but this moment is over, and there’s invariably an ache for more. Rick pulls free of Daryl, leaves him gasping and open and empty, and they stay, for just a second. Rick holds onto Daryl, Daryl holds onto the tree, and together they try to convince themselves to go back. To not just run. That there is more beyond one another, even when it doesn’t feel like it.

And then they go. The prison waits; their family waits. There’s a smile stretching Daryl’s mouth a little too garishly wide, and Rick has to smile then, too. He takes Daryl’s hand, trails a half step behind, catches a glimpse of teeth marks above the collar of his shirt. He follows his map home.

**Author's Note:**

> Title borrowed from Josh Ritter's "Change of Time."


End file.
